


Waiting

by fits_in_frames



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-14 10:42:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29044809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fits_in_frames/pseuds/fits_in_frames
Summary: "It takes the submarine two weeks to get from the Arctic Circle to anywhere near the South Pole."[A coda to "Cold War."]
Relationships: Eleventh Doctor/The Doctor's TARDIS
Kudos: 10





	Waiting

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote the bulk of this in 2013, right after "Cold War" aired, but I couldn't really make it work until now. So here's a story based on an episode from 8 years ago!
> 
> Thanks to my friend K for the beta-read <3

It takes the submarine two weeks to get from the Arctic Circle to anywhere near the South Pole. Since the crew seems to be slightly wary of her, Clara spends most of her time talking with the professor or reading one of his many novels. (Although she neither understands the psychic translation thing that the Doctor told her about, nor does she like the idea of it permeating her brain, she is quite grateful that it allows her to read Russian novels in their original language. The writing in many of them is quite beautiful, and it does wonders to alleviate her boredom.)

The Doctor, on the other hand, paces, calibrates and recalibrates every piece of onboard equipment, has long chats with Captain Zhukov, and generally is a nuisance to everyone and everything. Clara suspects this is a side effect of constant time-travel: the idea of time passing normally is enough to drive one mad, but actually experiencing it must be a nightmare. A waking one, if she's not mistaken, for she's fairly sure the Doctor never sleeps.

\--

(The TARDIS is waiting.

She's not used to waiting. Waiting is something that linear beings do, those with bodies and words and appointments. In fact, she shouldn't even know what "waiting" is beyond a cursory, theoretical understanding. But the reason she is waiting is, of course, The Talking.

If The Talking hadn't happened, she wouldn't understand things like _here_ or _far_ , _then_ or _after_ , _cold_ or _warm_. She wouldn't understand scent [the sharp, metallic perspiration on his neck] or look [the subdued, murky colors of his jacket] or feel [the rough, yielding surfaces of his fingers against her human-shell]. And she certainly wouldn't understand _now_ or _wait_.)

\--

Early on day fifteen, the Doctor starts commandeering the periscope every hour, on the hour. He sticks his face into the viewer with great anticipation, does a graceful 360º twirl, and then backs away with great disappointment.

"She has to be here," he mutters after the third time, so quietly that only Clara (perched on a console and fifteen pages from the end of _The Idiot_ ) can hear him. She looks up at him briefly, and then returns to her tale of Imperial Russian betrayal. He sighs, exasperated, and retreats from the cabin.

Six hours later, when she is a quarter of the way into a poor, Communist-slanting translation of _The Great Gatsby_ , she hears him holler from several cabins away. She drops the novel haphazardly on the bench next to her and runs to see what has happened. The Doctor is practically bouncing, like a small boy who has just been told he can have ice cream for dinner, and smiling so big Clara thinks he might burst something.

"She's there," he says, breathlessly, pointing at the periscope.

\--

(She and her Thief are together in the _future_ now and the _past_ now. The TARDIS knows this, and yet she is choosing, deliberately and with quite a bit of effort, to remain in her relative present--in _her_ now. An ache spreads across her circuits, and she allows it to run rampant because she knows that it will disappear the moment he pushes her door open, like a willfully oblivious child, and sets one reluctant toe inside.

He will apologize, of course, because he will have been away from her for several days. And she will forgive him, of course, because leaving is just part of her programming. She will even allow the Familiar Girl inside, although she dislikes her for reasons she knows will become apparent once _now_ catches up with the missing, hidden pieces of her, as it always does.)

\--

One of the crew, a stocky, dark-haired man of no more than 20 (Clara feels terrible but she hasn't really bothered to learn their names as she'll never see them again) has jumped on the scope, and is shouting a bearing at the navigator. Zhukov slips into the cabin, observes the scene, and smiles.

"Thank you so much," the Doctor says, embracing him.

The captain pulls away but holds onto the Doctor's elbows. "Not a problem. I understand how it can be to be away from your ship for so long."

The Doctor claps his hands and turns back to the recently vacated scope, grinning widely as the sub comes to a stop.

Clara gathers her Vegas-ready clothes. By the time she makes her way to the exit, the Doctor is already halfway outside. She barely has time to say goodbye to the captain and thank the professor for letting her read his books before climbing up the ladder and into the freezing cold.

Another crew member (this one blond with wispy facial hair, probably about her age) follows behind her, wraps a spare overcoat around her shoulders, and begins guiding her on the ice. The Doctor is a few steps away in nothing but his thin, worn, normal clothes, holding his hand out for her, but, every few seconds, he eagerly glances at the TARDIS, balanced perfectly near the edge of the ice floe, a hundred meters away.

"Go," she says with the tone of an overworked nanny.

"You sure?" the Doctor asks, half wanting a real answer and half not.

She nods. "I'll be fine."

He balls up his fists a little, turns, and practically runs towards the big blue box. He slides up to it comically, and she can't help but laugh.

"What's so funny?" the Russian asks her.

"It's like Tom Cruise," she says, and starts to sing, but upon looking at his face, she realizes that he probably won't see _Risky Business_ or even hear Bob Seger for another ten years. "Never mind." There's only a little bit left to go, so she reassures him she can make it on her own, and the very grateful, very cold Russian shuffles back to the sub.

As she approaches the TARDIS, quickly but carefully, she sees that the Doctor has his fingertips lightly pressed against the door, his mouth half open and his eyes squeezed shut. If she didn't know better she'd think he was praying.

\--

(He has always been her biggest missing piece, from the very beginning, when her consciousness was still a quarry to be excavated, when she only knew the _when_ and _what_ of their history, not the _how_ or the _why_.)

\--

"You gonna go in?" Clara asks, rubbing her hands together. "'S freezing out here."

The Doctor's mouth quirks up into a slight smile as he turns the key in the lock and cautiously steps inside. Clara can feel the warmth even before she's past the doors, and by the time she's inside, the Doctor is already standing at the console, hands on the edges, arms spread as wide as they can go. He leans in and stage-whispers, "Miss me?" He glances over at Clara, knowing she heard him, and raises his eyebrows.

She just shakes her head, affectionately.

He turns back to the console. "Missed you too," he mumbles, running his thumb along the nearest dial. This time she's sure he did not intend for her to hear him, so she pretends she didn't. He inhales, chest puffing up, ready for a new adventure. "Right. Where to?"

He looks over at her, all scraggly hair and an ill-fitting, Russian Navy-issue overcoat. She only squints at him disapprovingly.

"Home, got it," he says obediently, and starts pressing buttons and turning cranks, all of which hum contentedly under his fingers.

And though she'll never admit it, at this moment, Clara actually feels more at home in this box than she ever has before or, she's certain, ever will after.

\--

(When he arrives, finally, it has been both a very long time, and also just a nanosecond. _Now_ has come, and gone, and she will forevermore understand the appeal of linear time, of waiting for someone--of missing them, on purpose. Because having her Thief back, safely cradled in her matrix, is the closest thing to _delight_ she can possibly imagine, and she can imagine everything.)

**Author's Note:**

> {Come say hi on [Tumblr](https://dreamsincolor.tumblr.com/) or [Twitter](https://twitter.com/fits_in_frames)!}


End file.
